The hottest revolution in American cycling doesn't have a name, a mission, or a coherent identity. But if you slow down long enough and look around, you might notice it—and join in the fun.

I COULDN'T WAIT FOR MY SON TO TURN SIX MONTHS OLD. Not because his smile became more infectious, even as his stream-of-conscious babbling seemed to edge closer to real vocabulary. Definitely not because he'd stop spitting up. (He didn't.) And to hell with early crawling.

The streets of Los Angeles may not seem an intuitive choice for a first ride, or maybe any ride involving an overly eager dad and his baby. But my wife needed the car for a crosstown appointment, and Otto had to get home from daycare somehow. So at rush hour on an chilly April afternoon, I pedaled onto Figueroa Street, passing gas stations and markets and a local bottle shop whose neon sign boasted the Coldest Beer in Town, pulling a fancy new trailer behind my definitely not-fancy converted touring bike.

I was sweating as I buckled Otto, just rising from a nap, into the carrier. One of the little girls from the center watched from the front yard as I put my helmet on. "Is that Baby Otto's bike?"

I thought about it for a second. "Yeah," I said. "Guess it is."

"Cool," she said.

I was expecting to feel nervous, maybe scared, as I merged with traffic. Would cars give me enough room? Would the potholed streets of L.A. be too rough? As I started off, though, I quieted my worries and listened. Otto was making what I call his "remarkable" sound, an astonished gasp he'd previously summoned around our cat or a bunch of helium balloons that floated by. The sound soon gave way to giggling. The girl was right: This was cool.

Over the next few weeks, as I dragged Otto to the grocery store, the nearby bike path, or to visit friends, I became more comfortable in traffic—in fact, people give you so much room when you're towing a trailer that it feels like the safest way to ride—and I began to notice all the people on bikes around me. There were riders loaded with groceries or dry cleaning or yoga mats. I saw well-dressed women rolling along my city's boulevard with what seemed to be a dual purpose: to see what was around them and to be seen. I wove past couples pedaling in wobbly lines of blissful unawareness out on bike-path jaunts. I noted the jumble of upright bikes at farmers' markets, looking fashionable but also built to handle loads of fresh basil and organic potatoes.

Some of these slow-speed, short-hop riders saddled up on department-store bikes; others pedaled barely refurbished 1970s tourers. The young ones often rode colorful fixies, while the older cyclists favored three-speeds, in basic hues—bikes that were almost generic but somehow still stylish.

It seemed like more bikes were being ridden more than I'd ever noticed, and in more places than ever. But this wasn't about bike riding as we often think of it—to race, or to get fit, or to get to work.

This felt like play.

WELCOME TO URBAN CYCLING'S NEWEST WAVE, in which riding moves beyond infrastructure and advocacy to a whole new set of criteria for what constitutes a good bike, and a good bike ride. The days are early, and clues to the phenomenon can be obscure, appearing in unexpected places: in the pages of Martha Stewart Living or Dwell magazines, for example. Or on websites that celebrate bikes not just as objects of function, but also fashion and fun.

But the end result of this latest wave could be huge, even transformative: a return to the days when bikes were a basic component of everyday life, and not just technologically advanced machines reserved for the fit. Think of it as cycling's slow-food movement.

My garage reflects this shift. It stores a lovely carbon-fiber race bike, a second, custom-built titanium road bike, and a mountain bike laden with top-of-the-line parts. Tucked amid them, used least of all pre-Otto, is my green Bianchi—heavy, with full fenders and sturdy rear rack. It's by far the least sexy of the quartet—but recently it has become utterly central to my universe.

My closet tells a similar story. Four pairs of cleated shoes are stacked next to a week's worth of fresh chamois. I own dozens of jerseys, some of them race mementos. I never shaved my legs, but I was fussy enough to match my water bottles before going for a ride.

The Bianchi demands none of that. After taking it on a month-long crossing of western China, I modified it for light city riding. Once my circumstances evolved and expanded how I rode, my panniers became receptacles for groceries; soon, I had zip-tied them to the bike. Instead of spanning continents, my rides now hardly cross neighborhoods. My typical solo jaunt is to a Cuban bakery, where I read comic books and eat saddle-sized slices of guava pie. The Bianchi got dented and gooey gel started leaking from my handlebar tape, but I didn't mind. Riding never felt so easy and natural. It touched a vague memory—one so obscure that I might have been recalling a dream—of rolling around the streets of New York as a teenager, not knowing that a "bike world" existed beyond my bike and my world.

IT CAN BE A CHALLENGE TO DEFINE a transformation in cycling that has no real name or homogenous identity—a movement that doesn't see itself as such. But the numbers confirm that we're changing the way—and the places—we ride. From 2005 to 2009, according to the U.S. Census, bike travel in the 70 largest American cities increased by 37 percent. What's surprising is where the biggest gains were. In surveys conducted by the League of American Cyclists, ridership in cities not recognized as bicycle-friendly has steadily outpaced that in places that openly embraced cycling. And momentum is building. The largest jumps came in 2009, the most recent year for which statistics are available. Over 2008, the towns that didn't fall into the bike-welcoming categories—like Dallas, New Orleans, and Omaha, Nebraska—saw a 29 percent boost. That's compared with just 1 percent in some places that publicly professed two-wheeled love.

What's behind the surge? Gas prices went up. Groups that previously lobbied alone—cyclists, pedestrians, mass-transit advocates—coalesced into a single alternative-transportation movement. In cities, a keep-it-close-to-home sensibility, evidenced by the popularity of farm-to-table restaurants and local brewpubs, has expanded naturally to include bikes. That's showing up at cash registers. Sales of both high-and low-end urban tires have gone up: Soma's Everwear and Panaracer's Ribmo, for example, have been runaway hits, even at prices reaching $50—that's a lot for a utility model—with units sold reaching into the six figures.

How did all this happen? It's not just that there are more people on bikes. There's plenty of evidence that geeks like me—people who covet cutting-edge components and carbon fiber—have simply added a bike to their collection, a machine that offers a kind of low-tech, unpretentious simplicity. San Francisco's Public Bikes is typical of the new-wave companies bringing nontraditional creativity to the bike industry. Founder Rob Forbes had previously created Design Within Reach, a vendor of high-aesthetic and high-function urban furniture and accessories. Public Bikes, which Forbes launched in 2010, brings the DWR perspective to bikes with simple, attractive, and functional models whose appeal stretches beyond conventional bike tradition.

The company sells mostly by mail order, via a website that's a model of straightforwardness. Purchasers are asked just four questions: how fast; traditional or step-through frame; height; and budget, with prices starting at $550. (Colors vary based on frame selection.) Accessories are sold in a $170 "new rider essentials" pack, with a lock, rack, bell, front and rear lights, and a helmet from Nutcase (which are good-looking enough that casual riders see them as a want-to-wear item).

These basic bikes reverse an aesthetic that's been dominant for years. Logos are kept to a minimum. Colors are simple. "We noticed that people were always peeling the stickers off their regular bikes," says Adam McDowell, founder of Linus Cycles, a two-year-old company based in Venice Beach, California. There's just a single logo on a Linus bike, which is available in three basic colors.

McDowell calls his company's offerings "nonenthusiast bikes." That may be true, but there's plenty of enthusiasm for these kinds of bikes among people who have been riding for decades.

THIS KIND OF PIONEERING ENERGY—interpreting and delivering the basics in a good-looking, good-performing, easy-to-understand package—is harder than it looks. That's because many old-school riders have often greeted these bikes with a sort of "yeah, but" attitude. Yeah, but they don't use quality components, or they're heavy, or you can't use them for long rides.

We were missing the point—and sometimes the fun, too. Alissa Walker, an L.A.-based freelance writer, recently bought a bright-orange Public J7 (seven-speed, step-through frame, $550 plus shipping) in time for CicLAvia, a close-the-streets-to-cars festival that attracted tens of thousands of riders earlier this year.

The 33-year-old Walker, whose CicLAvia ensemble was a sundress and wide-brimmed hat, says that in picking the J7, "style was absolutely most important to me." That wasn't just about looking cute. Her bike had to allow her to "wear normal clothes, including regular shoes, and get to my destination looking the same as when I left home."

A step-through frame was also key: "I never wear pants, and needed something I could ride in a dress. And Public's pedals are grippy and wide—great for riding in any shoes, including heels."

I saw Walker early at the event; we planned to ride together—I was pulling the trailer—but I quickly lost her in the crowd. Five times that day, I thought I'd caught sight of her, only to realize I had spotted another well-dressed woman on another orange Public.

This was no surprise: Held for the first time in 2010, CicLAvia seemed to represent a sea change for riding in my adopted hometown. The event included the unprecedented closure of 7 miles of city streets. There was music, and food, and some mild yodeling, which is as good an indicator of delight as anything anyone could think of. Inspired by an event in South America, the CicLAvia concept will spread to 14 U.S. cities this year. Sprawling Atlanta, often cited as America's most bike-hostile town, is hosting two in 2011.

A corollary to the "yeah, but" attitude is one that says that buying a bike because you'll look great on it is somehow shallow. I had those thoughts, too, until I opened my clothes closet for a "regular" road ride and saw, neatly folded, my matching baby-blue Lampre jersey, shorts, gloves, and socks. In other words, Walker is merely expanding on one of cycling's sacred tenets: that rider and bike matched equals serious style.

Many shops have taken steps to keep up with the altered buying habits of a generation raised on Amazon and Netflix. They have given more of the showroom over to the likes of Linus and Specialized's Globe line, and counters mail-order's convenience with free guaranteed assembly.

I was recently at a housewarming party in L.A.'s diverse Echo Park neighborhood. My friend Amanda Colligan rolled up on a $299 Windsor, a by-mail bike positioned as a half-price Linus. Colligan, 35, has spent some time on a more serious road bike, so she went into the process well informed. "As a second bike, the price was as much as I was willing to pay," she says.

Bikes in that range at her local shop were mostly "ugly hybrids," she says. "And it was just easier to get the bike delivered. Assembling it wasn't that hard." One mail-order advantage she and Walker cited: the ability to pick your own color. Colligan knows that her Windsor isn't the $700 Linus it compares itself to. But she saw that as an advantage: Because Windsor cut corners, the bike will be less desirable to thieves. "I like being able to lock up my bike and not worry about it," she says.

Colligan says it took a little time to get used to the bargain-basement concept. "The day it arrived," she says, "I went through a few stages of emotion: excitement, vague disappointment as I noticed how cheap the parts were, then excitement when I took it for a ride." She pedaled it to a dinner party, tucking a bottle of wine and a salad spinner in the front basket. "It just felt nice," she says, "to cruise along."

As for the traditional companies? For years, they've tried varying approaches. Specialized gets credit for being almost too far out front. Its first-generation Globe bikes, introduced in 1995, nailed the current profile, with a beautifully contoured frame matched to a seven-speed, internal-gear, silent-running drivetrain, plus rack, fenders, and lights. The line was killed after two seasons. "Bike shops weren't ready for it," says Chris Murphy, a former Specialized product manager who spearheaded the Globe project. "They didn't get that there was a whole new world of people who wanted to ride bikes." In 2009, Globe made a uniquely positioned comeback: The Specialized name is barely visible on Globe's freestanding website. This time, the line is a success.

In 2005, mountain-bike pioneer Joe Breeze launched a line of Europe-inspired city bikes. At the time, Breeze said the bikes were for "people who walk into a shop with an idea of want they want—something to get them to the store, or to school, or around town—and end up in a room full of stripped-down roadsters." Breeze sold complete bikes, loaded with racks, fenders, lights, and kickstands, allowing the purchaser to "just take it home."

Breeze, too, arrived early, but he stuck with his line, which eventually succeeded. He simultaneously returned to mountain and road bikes and supplemented the city offerings with electric-assist models.

Others, perhaps most notably Electra, nailed the concept so completely that it's hard to tell whether they arrived at the perfect time or simply executed the bike-as-fashion-accessory concept so cannily that they helped usher in the movement. Most major bike makers are now on board. Trek's Soho line is good-looking and innovative, and the included custom coffee mug is brilliant.

The result is a best-of-all-worlds situation. Roadies can turn to brands they know and trust for a new type of bike. And new riders can tap into the beginner-friendly rubric of the upstarts.

Exhibit A is my wife, a newcomer to the sport who was driven mad by the way city bikes are classified in traditional catalogs, with near-synonyms like urban, lifestyle, fast city, and cruiser. She was able to pick out the Public she wanted in five minutes, both proving the point and completing my Christmas shopping months early.

THIS PATCHWORK OF IDEAS, INNOVATION, and entrepreneurship adds up to the emergence of a truly American model of cycling. Rejected are earlier notions, patterned after Europe, that were centered around costly infrastructure projects. They always contained a bit of wishful thinking: paint enough stripes and riders will appear.

When that kind of thinking has been effective, it has been in more compact cities like New York and Portland, Oregon. It is a nonstarter in sprawl, which offers expansive terrain seen not as blight, but as something with the potential for limitless adventure.

Will Campbell is a two-decade, 5,000-mile-a-year commuter who recently began leading themed rides across L.A. The city, he says, "makes it possible to never take the same route twice. That's an amazing opportunity for exploration." Partially because the city's car-oriented bureaucracy has been spectacularly incompetent at implementing proposed bike plans, local riding has become a ground-up movement, centered around low-mileage events and support for bikes through neighborhood councils that outpace slow-footed bureaucrats at city hall. This cycling reality reflects the best elements of America itself: individual, creative, and grown from the bottom up.

I'm almost stunned at the way my cycling routine re-centered itself around overstuffed panniers, accepting a dinged frame, and forgoing maintenance. I don't intend to abandon my road or mountain bikes, but dang: This is easy.

Best of all is the idea that I'm already passing on something meaningful to my son. For Otto, life in the trailer has become mostly routine. Ten feet out the door and he's asleep, and I love what this evokes: moving so gently, so sweetly, that the destination, for a child still in his first year, is dreamland.

But even better is when Otto is awake. That's when I hear the giggles, gasps, and a general voicing of joy rising up behind me. And when I see other riders, flitting along, baskets full of groceries, pedaling in dungarees, with helmets that, if they're wearing them at all, are tilted at odd, unsafe, and simply charming angles, I can't help but feel we're all riding toward a dream come true, easily and together, where exhilaration replaces acceleration.

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